Zero to Awesome Redeux! 31 Day Project

Day 4 - Evening





Sold more stuff over the evening, for really good prices. Aside from a couple of ATOs (one of which I already sold, above), I didn't buy anything. Today was a day to be selling rather than buying, but it was a good day for me and I used the money I made to place a bunch of bids on stuff, so we'll see how long it takes for all of that to pan out.





Since I had lots of money and several empty market slots, it seemed like a good time to buy Halloween salvage for a third costume. ^_^

I ran five hero tips. Tomorrow night I should be able to confirm hero morality, and then run some SSA content for hero merits.

I grabbed all the explore badges for Skyway and Faultline, and then a friend was starting up a Penelope Yin Task Force. At last! I joined that, and after some wanted to run Positron 2. Eh... well, it's still experience and merits, and we ran it fast, finishing in 27 minutes.

At the moment I'm 24, almost 25.

Great to have another project thread from Organica! I greatly enjoyed the last one and this one is looking every bit as interesting.

I'm marking this page as a reference. I've been playing a long time, and just never understood the intricacies of the market. This will be a big help. Thanks!

Are we there yet?
*Bouncy*Bouncy*Bouncy*
Are we there yet?
*Bouncy*Bouncy*Bouncy*
Are we there yet?
*Bouncy*Bouncy*Bouncy*
Are we there yet?
*Bouncy*Bouncy*Bouncy*


Anyhoo. Good, informative thread so far Organica.
Maybe some people will realize that pulling decent sums of Inf out of the market isn't *hhhhaaaaarrrrrd*.

Clicking on the linked image above will take you off the City of Heroes site. However, the guides will be linked back here.

Sentry, Organica explains why she is starting from 0 in the first post. Rather than me paraphrasing, please read the 1st post of this thread.

Organica, your tip about buying and vending SOs made one of my lowbies his first million tonight. I had been doing unpopular rare recipes, but this was much faster and easier. I didn't even know people put SOs up on the auction house.

Very nice! I have to say, sometimes I'm the one dumping SOs on the market... if I don't delete them outright. When I'm busy doing other things and they're cluttering my inventory and I can't be bothered to find a store, that's what I sometimes do.

Day 5 -- July 5, 2012

Tonight was not a good night for leveling Dilithium Flower. I had to work a half hour overtime and run errands after, so I got home late. After marketing I managed 1 tip mission and then alted to join an ITF. The good news is I got levels 46 and 47 on Jennie Nova, who I intend to be my next level 50 character. The bad news is, my build is messed up slightly and I have to do a respec, which I didn't have time for. (For that matter -- on July 4th I played an old energy/energy blaster, Liberty or Debt. Got her to 45, made a tricorner hat revolutionary costume for her, had fun. Decided I should IO her out -- she's one of my few high level characters with no build -- so I worked up a build in MIDS. But of course, I've had no time to implement it.)

Later I was able to run a 2nd tip mission before I decided to join some friends running the Summer event. Did two runs on Tiffany Blackheart and Sparks Fly, got the badges I was missing, had fun, but that was my evening -- no more time to do anything with Dilithium. I'll have to confirm hero status tomorrow night, and see if I can run an SSA or two. Two things I still want to demonstrate is how to use merits to earn money, and how to use converters -- I've earned two converters so far, so I'm saving them up for later.

Anyway! I'm still level 24.



Here we see what I bid on last night. For the most part... I think I adjusted a couple of my bids after this and bid on a couple of other things. But basically, this shows what I'm trying to accomplish currently. In all cases I'm bidding slightly higher than the lowest recent purchase. Usually I can tell that this was a lowball bid from some other marketeer, but sometimes I'm just guessing at what the lowest bid point is.



Here you see what I bought by this evening. Nothing much sold (a generic accuracy IO was all), but I bought a lot of stuff to make money with.





I wanted to show my aggressive pricing on the crafted IOs. The Decimations are selling for as much as 50 million, and there's only 17 for sale -- so I'm going to list for 41 million in the hopes that I can get a 45 to 50 million bid. I'm fairly confident there are few or none listed below that price in any event.

For the Eradication, they are selling for as much as 35 million with only 17 for sale again, so I'm going to try and hit that price by listing for 31 million.

This kind of aggressive pricing means I may have to wait a day or three for these things to sell, and I'm somewhat vulnerable to another marketeer adding a bunch of the same thing to the market and undercutting me/driving down the price. That happens, sometimes, but more often than not I make my sale. ^_^



Here's everything I have for sale by the time I'm done. I'm in good shape -- I have a lot of stuff for sale again, and more stuff in my inventory waiting to sell.





After the ITF, I had one thing sold, and another thing bought.



And after the two Summer Event runs I had two more things sold (one of which I'd listed after claiming the previous sale).

And that was my evening. Still 24, but I have over 100 million on me and more importantly, have a market full of things listed for sale or outstanding bids that might still fill. So even though it looks like I keep hovering around the 100 million mark, I'm actually doing very well atm. ^_^

Interesting stuff. I'll keep an eye on this.

So when you get to a higher level or get more influence/infamy are ATO's the highest amount of profit you can get? If not what do you usually do to make the highest profit

The ATO that sells the highest is probably the Brute one, and that one will sell for over 100 million, up to maybe 150 million sometimes.

Purple damage recipes/IOs (Apocalypse, Armageddon, Hectacomb, Ragnarok) sell from around 125 to 300 million or so. So they sell better than the ATOs.

Certain Hami-O's such as Cytoskeletons (good for defensive powers) sell from as low as 200 million to upwards of 500 million or more, depending. I see one just sold for 900 million, but that's an abnormally high price; I've bought them for just around 200 million within the last week or two.

The Gladiator's Armor +3% defense crafted IO sells for 200-300 million, but for some unknown reason (well I know the reason, people are stupid) the recipe sells for much more. One just sold for a billion influence, I see.

So... there are things that you can make more profit from per transaction than ATOs. But you can make a ton of money flipping ATOs. But the days of purples for 800 million and certain PvP IOs for 2 billion or more seem gone. At least, until inflation catches back up to where we were before, I guess.

Yeah ever since enhancement converters purple sets have hit a plateau and now sell for very similar prices its good and not so good at the same time. And the reason for the recipe being higher is probably because there are more of the enhancements on the market than recipes because people convert all their pvp enhancements to try and get that one to make inf

Day 6 - July 6, 2012

Today I played through my worst Summer Event experience yet. I let a bunch of citizens die in a fire but was still proclaimed a hero, and I beat up a super-powered nazi. But first:











I bought a few things and sold some stuff over the course of the day. I'm sitting on about 300 million influence at the moment, with several bids in, stuff for sale, and more stuff waiting to list.

As for everything else... my goal was to confirm hero status and then run SSA1, and get to at least level 25 or 26 along the way. But I'd run into Laura Lockheart (new mid level contract in Steel Canyon), and I've never run her arc, so I decided that would be a better way to get tips than just street sweeping.

There's a mission in there where you're supposed to break up a bunch of fights between Council and 5th Column. And you're on a timer, and you get a badge if you do it in time, but I was chatting with friends in my global channel and didn't realize. So bombs and buildings blew up and people died. Ah well!

Eventually I stopped to run tip missions and completed 3 of them, then my morality mission. It was the Blast Furnace one, I hate that one. Well, I pretty much hate all of the ones he's in, not because of him but because they're usually pretty annoying. This one has ambushes and stupid dialogue.

Afterwards I ran through the first Signature Story Arc #1 three times -- twice for a hero merit (your first time through you can do this twice in a row) and the third time for 20 regular merits -- still a pretty good deal for 10 minutes or so of work. I had to chew purple inspirations to manage it, but the reward was sweet:





I want to use some merits to demonstrate buying recipes to sell and random rolling to sell, but first things first. I'd noticed I was having endurance issues, so a Miracle +end IO was in order. I bought it, crafted it, and slotted it.



After this I joined a Summer Event via the LFG tool. I'd been kind of avoiding this because I didn't think my character was necessarily powerful enough to pull her own weight, but now I was 25 with a Miracle slotted, I decided to go for it. It was worse than imagined. Our team was a level 50 darkness controller and a level 48 mental blaster, both of whom clearly had no defense and were strangely weak in damage, and a level 17 tank who was virtually useless for damage and also pretty clueless about the event. And me of course, only level 25, no defense, strictly a generic IO build save for the Miracle unique.

The first part of the Casino Heist went okay, but we had a terrible time bringing down the AV. Then in the second part, the tank, playing the Hitter, clearly had no idea who to talk to or what to say to them. But that was okay, we manage to struggle through the second AV, and never saw the third of course.

Next came the arena and we were well out of our league, with a tank who couldn't tank or do damage and three range/support toons who couldn't keep from dying over and over. Then our tank quit. Someone made a comment about how much they disliked quitters, and I got the impression that everyone else wanted to try and finish. I wanted the reward too, so we slogged on.

Our ninja total was anemic. The crowd turned permanently against us (something I'd never seen). We took forever against Frank McCain, and there was no hope that we could kill him and his dog together. We killed maybe 15 monkeys, and then it was an endless slog against the two blasting bots and the titan weapon beast that nobody could tank. But I discovered after multiple deaths that I could buy inspirations at the consession stand, and we managed to struggle through to the end.

And... I was well rewarded for my trouble:



After that I went back to the Laura Lockheart arc. One of the final missions has destroyed walls and elevators, and you can drop down through the open shafts to the next level. I thought that was pretty cool. ^_^





I ran two more tips and did some street sweeping to hit 26, and that was the end of my evening.

Villain Plan by Mids' Villain Designer 1.957
http://www.cohplanner.com/

Click this DataLink to open the build!

Dilithium Flower: Level 50 Magic Dominator
Primary Power Set: Plant Control
Secondary Power Set: Fiery Assault
Power Pool: Flight
Power Pool: Leadership
Power Pool: Speed
Power Pool: Fighting
Ancillary Pool: Mace Mastery

Villain Profile:
Level 1: Strangler -- BasGaze-Acc/EndRdx/Rchg/Hold(A), BasGaze-EndRdx/Rchg/Hold(3), BasGaze-Acc/Hold(3), BasGaze-Rchg/Hold(5)
Level 1: Flares -- Decim-Acc/EndRdx/Rchg(A), Decim-Dmg/Rchg(5), Decim-Dmg/EndRdx(7), Decim-Acc/Dmg/Rchg(7), Decim-Acc/Dmg(9)
Level 2: Incinerate -- KntkC'bat-Dmg/EndRdx(A), KntkC'bat-Acc/Dmg(9), KntkC'bat-Dmg/Rchg(11), KntkC'bat-Dmg/EndRdx/Rchg(11)
Level 4: Roots -- Enf'dOp-Acc/Immob(A), Enf'dOp-Acc/EndRdx(13), Enf'dOp-EndRdx/Immob(13), Enf'dOp-Immob/Rng(15), Enf'dOp-Acc/Immob/Rchg(15), Enf'dOp-Acc/Rchg(17)
Level 6: Fire Breath -- Posi-Dmg/Rng(A), Posi-Dmg/Rchg(17), Posi-Dmg/EndRdx(19), Posi-Acc/Dmg/EndRdx(19), Posi-Acc/Dmg(21)
Level 8: Seeds of Confusion -- AotDominator-Acc/Conf/Hold/Immob/Sleep/Stun/Fear(A), AotDominator-Conf/Hold/Immob/Sleep/Stun/Fear/Rchg(34), AotDominator-EndRdx/Rchg(34), AotDominator-Acc/Conf/Hold/Immob/Sleep/Stun/Fear/EndRdx(34), AotDominator-Acc/Conf/Hold/Immob/Sleep/Stun/Fear/EndRdx/Rchg(36), AotDominator-Rchg/+Dmg%(37)
Level 10: Fire Blast -- Decim-Acc/EndRdx/Rchg(A), Decim-Dmg/Rchg(23), Decim-Dmg/EndRdx(25), Decim-Acc/Dmg(27), Decim-Acc/Dmg/Rchg(27)
Level 12: Spirit Tree -- Dct'dW-Rchg(A), Dct'dW-Heal(29), Dct'dW-Heal/EndRdx(29), Dct'dW-Heal/Rchg(31), Dct'dW-Heal/EndRdx/Rchg(33)
Level 14: Fly -- Frbd-Stlth(A), Winter-ResSlow(50)
Level 16: Maneuvers -- LkGmblr-Rchg+(A), LkGmblr-Def(21), HO:Cyto(23)
Level 18: Vines -- BasGaze-Acc/EndRdx/Rchg/Hold(A), BasGaze-EndRdx/Rchg/Hold(37), BasGaze-Acc/Hold(37), BasGaze-Rchg/Hold(39)
Level 20: Embrace of Fire -- RechRdx-I(A)
Level 22: Hasten -- RechRdx-I(A), RechRdx-I(50)
Level 24: Hover -- LkGmblr-Rchg+(A), LkGmblr-Def(25), Ksmt-ToHit+(50)
Level 26: Carrion Creepers -- GravAnch-Immob/Rchg(A), GravAnch-Acc/Immob/Rchg(39), GravAnch-Acc/Rchg(39), GravAnch-Immob/EndRdx(40), GravAnch-Hold%(40)
Level 28: Boxing -- Dmg-I(A)
Level 30: Tough -- S'fstPrt-ResKB(A), S'fstPrt-ResDam/Def+(31), GA-3defTpProc(31)
Level 32: Fly Trap -- C'Arms-EndRdx/Dmg/Rchg(A), C'Arms-Acc/Dmg/Rchg(40), C'Arms-Acc/Dmg(42), C'Arms-Dmg/EndRdx(43)
Level 35: Scorpion Shield -- LkGmblr-Rchg+(A), LkGmblr-Def(36), HO:Cyto(36)
Level 38: Blaze -- Decim-Acc/EndRdx/Rchg(A), Decim-Acc/Dmg/Rchg(43), Decim-Dmg/EndRdx(43), Decim-Acc/Dmg(45), Decim-Dmg/Rchg(45)
Level 41: Weave -- LkGmblr-Rchg+(A), LkGmblr-Def(42), HO:Cyto(42)
Level 44: Disruptor Blast -- Dmg-I(A), Dmg-I(45), Dmg-I(46), Dmg-I(46), Dmg-I(46)
Level 47: Summon Tarantula -- C'Arms-EndRdx/Dmg/Rchg(A), C'Arms-Acc/Dmg/Rchg(48), C'Arms-Dmg/EndRdx(48), C'Arms-Acc/Dmg(48)
Level 49: Assault -- EndRdx-I(A)
Level 1: Brawl -- Empty(A)
Level 1: Domination
Level 1: Prestige Power Dash -- Empty(A)
Level 1: Prestige Power Slide -- Empty(A)
Level 1: Prestige Power Quick -- Empty(A)
Level 1: Prestige Power Rush -- Empty(A)
Level 1: Prestige Power Surge -- Empty(A)
Level 1: Sprint -- Empty(A)
Level 2: Rest -- Empty(A)
Level 4: Ninja Run
Level 2: Swift -- Run-I(A)
Level 2: Health -- Mrcl-Rcvry+(A), Numna-Regen/Rcvry+(33)
Level 2: Hurdle -- Jump-I(A)
Level 2: Stamina -- P'Shift-EndMod(A), P'Shift-End%(33)
------------


I also worked up a build for my Dom.

This build gives me capped smashing/lethal defense and very good energy defense. I'm not sure what I need for Permadom, but I have 103.8% global recharge so I can't be far off. The five generic IOs in Disruptor Blast are placeholders for the Overwhelming Force set, although I'm not convinced I want to five-slot that. And there are other things I'm still debating about the build, but on the whole this is what I want to shoot for.

Expensive stuffs: The Cytoskeletons and Glad Armor +3% defense IO, at least 200 million each (at best). Basilisk's Gaze and Kinetic Combats are notoriously expensive, and the Call to Arms and Decimations are pricey too. The Luck of the Gamblers as well, of course. And then there's a Gravitational Anchor set -- five purples. I don't know if I can swing that one in 30 days, that's probably my final goal, and if I have to slot something else instead that will be okay.

But there you have it, a very nice (and expensive) build to shoot for. ^_^

You don't quite need to have 123% recharge all the time - generally, while hasten is up you'll have more than that, so even without perma-hasten you can still have permadom even though when hasten's down you'll have less than 123% recharge. The actual math is a bit more complicated, but the conclusions are explained in this thread:

http://boards.cityofheroes.com/showthread.php?t=120644

In a nutshell, if you have 3 SOs in hasten, you need anything more than 70% global. If you've got 3 level 50 IOs in hasten, your global requirement drops all the way to 69%. It's not listed in the table at the beginning of that thread, but with 2 level 50 recharge you need ~72% global. These are the bare minimums to just give you a couple seconds of overlap to hit it again, so ideally you'd want more. In your case your +100% global should be more than enough.

Good to know!

Day 7 - July 7, 2012

During my long play session yesterday evening I was talking in one of my global channels about how often villains kidnap homeless people, and someone else called them "Snackrifices". That word appealed to me. A bit later someone was trying to type "Hero Merits" and instead typed "Hero Mero Merits", and the name "Hero Mero" appealed to me as well.

One thing about having an account that is only VIP for one month is that I have 14 slots for characters on Virtue right at this moment, and even if I never plan to do anything else with them (most will be locked when I've gone back to premium), I can at least create 14 new characters to stuff into one of my solo Super Groups.

So Snackrifice, a catgirl demon Mastermind, and Hero Mero, a darkness blaster with a very traditional tights costume, now have come into being.



So far today I have sold nothing, but I used all my money to place a lot of bids on things, and you can see that I've bought stuff. I will have to do a bit of juggling to figure out where to put it all until I can get some of it to sell, but all's good. I'd say that my aggressive marketing strategy so far has boxed me into a corner just a bit, I'm better off when things sell quickly rather than going for the max sale price possible.

I also wanted to show that I placed a bid for 10 Performance Shifter end/rech recipes yesterday at 2.6 million, and I bought 8 of them, but clearly some other marketeer has since moved in and placed a bid of 2,687,748 on a bunch (probably another stack of 10, and possibly even someone reading this thread). But that's okay, for the moment 8 recipes plus all these ATOs is more than enough to keep me busy.

I don't know that I'll get much playing in today or tomorrow, but I'll be checking the auction once or twice a day at least.

------------

At this point I do something that might seem completely counter-intuitive: I give away 100,000,000.

Or, to be more specific, I "burn" 100 million at the Super Group Registrar.

Let's consider a few things:

A) I have 11 items for sale and nearly a full enhancement tray, and a bunch of more stuff that I've bought. I don't have a lot of space. And I still have 180 million on me at this point.

B) My one person supergroup has 77,000 prestige at this point. The smallest workroom possible costs 50,000 prestige, a crafting table, 15,000 prestige, and an enhancement table (stores 100 crafted enhancements) is, if I remember right, 95,000 prestige. None of that will require power or control to operate.

C) 100 million influence buys me 200,000 prestige.

D) Smallest workshop possible can hold 1 crafting table, 1 storage unit, and also 1 empowerment station, which only costs another 15,000 influence.







Here's my little base shop! What this gives me is access to a crafting table from any base portal, access to storage of 100 enhancements, and access to an empowerment station, which a lot of people don't use but trust me, it can be very helpful.

This is 100 million well spent.





I stop off at the university in Croatoa and craft anything that I have the salvage to craft. This turns out to be a level 30 accuracy, two level 25 endurance modifications and 1 level 25 endurance reduction, 2 level 30 recharges and 1 level 25 recharge. I don't necessarily have plans for these, but it seems like a better use of my random salvage drops than just selling it, and I have a place to dump 'em now.

I also drop most of the other stuff I'd bought into base storage, after crafting all of the Performance Shifters. I put a couple more things up for sale. When I'm done I actually have about 30 enhancements stored in my base.



And while I was in Croatoa I joined a team formed by Adeon Harkwood to kill Jack In Irons. We also killed another Jack in Irons and Eochai, got merits for those but no badge for Eochai since they'd been fighting each other for some time.

Only sold two things but it almost entirely made up the 100 million I'd spent on my base.

Other than that, I joined a Moonfire Task Force and later ran a tip misison, then joined a Yin Task Force. All of this got me to level 28.

I find this thread entertaining, and relevant to my interests!

I'm just wondering what would happen if everyone actually took traditional marketing advice and they ALL bid low and tried to sell high? Thankfully, human nature trumps good sense ^_^

Day 8 - July 8, 2012



Sold two things by this morning.

I pulled down some of my bids and things for sale. Performance Shifters are up to 42 for sale, with only about 80 people bidding, and the price has dropped to 20 million, so I relisted the ones I had for sale. Also, the only ATO I had bids out on, someone had moved in and was bidding more than me, so I rebid on those.

On the other hand, the Decimations that I have for sale haven't sold yet, but there are only 14 total for sale and lots of bids so I did not pull those down. I think I can get the price I want on them.

I ran two tip missions left over from yesterday. They were still set to level 26 so easy to blast through. Then I did SSA2 for another hero merit. I don't think I'd mentioned it, but I'd converted 50 hero merits (the 50 I got from confirming hero status actually) to a hero merit. As of today I had 202 regular merits so I converted another 50 to a hero merit, giving me 3 again. Then I bought a level 30 Numina +regen/+endurance, another cornerstone for my build and one of those things I like to slot as soon as possible.

The merit conversion is 20 million each time, so I've spent 40 million doing that.

As for the SSA2, the ending Elite Boss gave me some trouble. On my first attempt, I ate 3 purple inspirations and charged in on foot. I tried to confuse one of his minions, I tried to hold him, and I was quickly dead.

At the hospital I bought 8 purple inspirations and 3 red. Then I made my way back, and before charging in ate 4 purples and the reds. This time I hover blasted out of melee range, which worked much better. I ate the other four purples halfway through the fight, I had carrion creepers up this time, and dominate popped up towards the end of the fight, after which he was held and it was all over.

Plan 3 would have been to use the empowerment station in my base first. Plan 4 would have been... start the arc over and bring a friend, I guess.

Also I got a bit lucky... a level 26 Decimation accuracy/damage dropped sometime yesterday, and I even had the salvage to craft it already. It's one of the things I need for my build. It's only a common recipe but even so, nice to get it as a random drop like that.

Part of the problem is that since you're listing things publicly as you go, there are certainly people who're trying to undercut you just because they can. Not out of spite, but just so they can move their own stuff. But that doesn't seem to be affecting you too much so far, so mweh.

Well, I am taking that into account, of course. ^_^ That's another reason to diversify as much as I can, as well.

But I would say that in the case of the Performance Shifters, there is too much turnover for anyone to price me out of the market. Just as an example, There were something like 45 for sale this morning, but only 37 for sale this evening, and that's despite me putting several more up for sale (and selling them). Right now I'm selling them for around 20 million instead of 30-40 million, but since they cost less that 5 million to buy and craft, I have no worries.

I'm not selling any Efficacy Adaptors at the moment but it's the same story there. Everyone needs endurance, these IOs have high turnover.

The ATOs that I am targeting mostly have a steady but limited supply of new ones being put on the market, and a limited number for sale at any given time, so that also makes it hard to price me out of any particular niche.

For the other IOs that I bought and crafted, I mostly counted on a low supply to allow me to sell what I had before anyone attempted to undercut me. That worked well for the Eradication IOs, and while it has not worked so far for the Decimation IOs, there were 14 for sale this morning and 13 for sale when I last checked so the supply is still low enough that I hope mine will sell. Jury's still out, of course.

In the meantime, I didn't "play" any more today, but I checked on the market a few times. After repricing things, I sold a bunch of stuff:





So far so good! I'm mostly not buying anything at the moment, but the weekend is for selling. Monday/Tuesday I'll probably be buying more stuff. I've also been trying to buy a full set of the Dom ATO for my actual build -- I'm trying to lowball them, which is again, difficult on the weekend, so I only have 1 of 6 so far.

I'm over 400 million right now. Still level 28.

One more late night sale. Logged in an ran two tip missions. I should earn another hero merit tomorrow. ^_^

I liked the bio you posted. Nice John Carter reference. Llana of Gathol indeed!